1. Field of the Invention
In general, the present invention relates to wheeled carts that help a fisherman manually transport fishing equipment to and from the beach. More particularly, the present invention relates to the structure and specialized features of such wheeled carts.
2. Prior Art Description
People have fished along the shores of beaches for many thousands of years. During this long period of time, countless pieces of equipment have been designed to help fisherman transport equipment to and from the waterfront.
In industrialized countries, people who fish from the beach are, for the most part, leisure fishers who fish for their own enjoyment. The equipment used by such leisure fishermen include fishing poles, bait containers, tackle boxes, chairs, fishing pole stands and a variety of coolers and containers for holding food, drink and caught fish.
In very few places are fishermen allowed to drive vehicles directly to the waterfront of a beach. Rather, leisure fishermen are commonly required to carry their fishing gear a substantial distance from a vehicle parking lot to the water, across the width of a sandy beach.
The equipment used by leisure fishermen is usually too numerous and bulky to be carried by hand in a single trip. Consequently, a fisherman must either make multiple trips to hand carry the equipment or employ the use of some type of cart to help carry the equipment.
The prior art is replete with various types of carts that are intended to carry equipment along the sandy or stony ground of a beach. Many of these prior art carts contain features specifically design for use by leisure fisherman. For instance, in U.S. Pat. No. 5,333,885 to Pullman, entitled Fishing Cart Apparatus, a beach cart is shown that has features for holding fishing poles and other common fishing equipment. Similar prior art beach carts are exemplified by U.S. Pat. No. 6,082,757, to Lin, entitled Folding Collapsible Fishing Cart; and U.S. Pat. No. 5,340,135 to Womberly, entitled Hand Truck For Fishing Equipment.
Prior art fishing carts are often made to be as small and light as possible in order to be easily transportable. They also typically have wheels that enable the carts to be rolled to the waterfront across the width of a beach. A problem associated with such prior art portable fishing carts is that they typically hold equipment by stacking that equipment vertically. This causes the wheeled cart to have a high center of gravity, both when loaded and when unloaded. Accordingly, although such prior art fishing carts may be useful in transporting fishing poles to a beach, these same carts cannot be used to hold the fishing poles while fishing at the beach. Otherwise, if a strong wind is blowing along the beach, or if a fish pulls on a line, the cart holding the fishing pole can topple over.
Recognizing the tendency of portable beach carts to tip over, attempts have been made to make the beach carts more stable. Some prior art beach carts have augers that can be anchored into the sand at the beach, thereby holding the beach cart in a fixed, stable position. Such beach carts are exemplified by U.S. Pat. No. 6,113,129 to Marques, entitled Wheeled Beach Cart Construction. Of course, by anchoring a beach cart to the sand, the beach cart cannot be easily moved. This makes it difficult to change the position of the beach cart as the waterline at the beach ebbs and flows with the tide.
A more practical approach being used to make beach carts more stable is to design the beach cart to hold equipment in horizontal alignment rather than a vertical alignment. Such prior art beach carts are short and wide, having a low center of gravity. This makes the beach cart very stable, both when loaded with equipment and when unloaded. Such prior art beach carts are exemplified by U.S. Pat. No. 5,713,583 to Hansen, entitled Utility Cart For Concrete Fishing Operations. However, the broad, squat construction of such beach carts tends to make such beach carts very wide and bulky. It is therefore very difficult to store and transport such beach carts when they are not in use.
A need therefore exists for a beach cart that carries a large amount of equipment, yet is small, highly portable and very stable. This need is met by the present invention as described and claimed below.